Dear Family of St. John's,

God has been gracious to us since the founding of our parish in 2001. We began with 200 families; now, in the year 2025, we have grown to more than 3,200. Everything is GRACE! And as we celebrate our Silver Jubilee, is it critical for us to stop and think: Where would the Catholic Church be without priests, deacons, and religious?

We have heard it said that without the priesthood, there would be no Eucharist, and without the Eucharist, there would be no Church. The service of priests is essential to the life of Christ in the Church, and priests, deacons, and religious do not just fall from the heavens. Vocations to the priesthood, diaconate, or religious life come from among us, from our families. Who will answer the call?

For vocations to blossom among us, the ground must first be prepared. The seeds must be sown and the plants nurtured to produce the fruits we desire. We sow and nurture seeds of vocations in our parish by encouraging our own young men and women to listen for, consider, and respond to God's call.

This is where prayer becomes critical. We know from Fr. Patrick Peyton, CES. C, that "the Family that prays together, stays together." Prayers are the nutrients God works into the soil when He plants the seeds of vocations. They are thus essential in preparing and forming the hearts and minds of our people to answer God's call.

Praying for vocations is not just something we do on occasion: it needs to be frequent and persistent, an essential act, a must-do. That we should be praying for vocations comes directly from out Lord. "The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few' so ask the Master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest." (Luke 10:2)

Brothers and sisters of St. John's, I implore you to pray earnestly and persistently for vocations from our own families. One beautiful way you can do this is by taking into your homes the Vocation Chalice for a week. While it is in your home, you and your family are invited to pray intentionally for vocations from among our own families, especially to the priesthood of the Congregation of Holy Cross.

I will not be with you for much longer; other priests will come to serve you. However, without more vocations fostered through prayer, there may not be enough priests from the Congregation of Holy Cross to come here in the future. It is my earnest desire for more young men to answer the call to be deacons and Holy Cross priests and for men and women to be drawn to the religious life as Brothers and Sisters, especially within the Congregation of Holy Cross.

So, in closing, I ask you to please keep the children of our families, and the young men and women of our parish, close in prayer. Encourage them, nudge them along on their way to becoming holy men and women of God, saintly priests, deacons, or religious. The journey begins with each one of us, through prayer.

I love you will all be my head! Be Blessed!

-Fr. John Britto